(Ebook) Mother Of Pearl by Mary Morrissy ISBN 9781473524866, 1473524865, B015COLCQY

(Ebook) Mother Of Pearl by Mary Morrissy ISBN 9781473524866, 1473524865, B015COLCQY

Mother Of Pearl, the first novel by an acclaimed Irish short-story writer, explores the disturbing territory of the divided self.  "Mary Morrissy ranks among the very best... how she writes!" (Fay Weldon).A tubercular child, Irene is banished to a sanitorium where, long after she is cured, she remains as a ministering angel to the lonely and the sickly - especially the men, whose furtive groping in the dark still leaves her virginal in body and in soul. But when one patient misconstrues her mission, Irene seeks an escape - and a marriage proposal from Stanley Godwin provides it."Unsentimental, powerfully emotional, even-handed and generous, the novel has a rare compulsive quality.  It’s extremely unusual for a book to bring tears to my eyes these days, but Mother of Pearl managed it... It is a very fine novel indeed and deserves wide recognition.”  –  Carol Birch: New Statesman & SocietyThrough the story of the kidnapping of a baby, the notion of personal history as received fiction is examined. The novel asks: what makes a family? Is it mere kinship through blood, or something more profound and intricate? What keeps it together? What tears it apart? The action of the novel is seen through the eyes of a baby's mother, the kidnapper and the child itself. Dramatic, blackly funny and tragically topical, Mother Of Pearl is a remarkable achievement.